Running Commentary
by Afalstein
Summary: Part of the Exchange Program series. Professor Gandalf has left, and the new Defense against the Dark Arts professor is probably as unlike him as possible. But what does he have to teach?


**Running Commentary**

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><p>Hermoine practically bounced into her seat between Harry and Ron. "Guys!" she whispered. "Guysguysguys! Great news!"<p>

"Class has been canceled?" suggested Ron hopefully.

Momentarily, Hermoine's face took on an exasperated look. "No, no. Something better! We've got a new Defense against the Dark Arts professor!"

"What?" Harry's head rose from his desk. "Are you sure? Usually they last at least a year or so."

"Don't complain, for heaven's sake!" hissed Ron.

"I'm positive." Hermoine insisted. "Apparently Professor Gandalf just up and left over the weekend! Something about a ring and a dark lord and the end of the world… I didn't quite get the details. But he just left! Dumbledore really had to scramble to find somebody on such short notice!"

"Who'd he get?"

The sound of running feet down the hallway cut off any further comment, as the whole class turned toward the door. With breathtaking speed, a pale, emaciated man rushed in the door and slammed it shut.

Oblivious to the class, the man pressed his ear to the door and for a few long moments, said nothing. Then a relieved smile spread over his face. "I think they're gone." He whispered. "Yes, they're gone. Ha ha!" He gave a little hiccupped laugh. "I should be safe here." He muttered, turning around. "Should be…"

He froze, apparently seeing the students for the first time. His eyes flared wide and his body went as stiff as a rail. The class, for their part, stared in solemn silence at the man, taking in the not-quite beard, the threadbare robes, and the battered hat atop his head, which read, "WIZZARD."

"Hi!" said the man, smiling suddenly and forcibly.

The class seemed unsure how to take this. "Good morning?" suggested Ron.

"Yes. YES! Good morning, and it is a good morning, because you are good, and I am good, and therefore you have no desire to harm or kill me, do you?" The words, accompanied by an increasingly strained smile, came out in a rush.

The part at the end had such an air of a genuine question that Ron, after looking around the room for support, offered, "No?"

The man nearly collapsed with relief. "Oh." He said, sagging against the door. "So good. So glad to hear that. Listen, you children don't mind if I hang out in here for a year or two, do you? I'm supposed to be teaching a class, but there's a most frightful…"

"A class?" Hermoine piped up.

An unpleasant notion struck Harry. "Are you… are you supposed to be our new professor?" He asked reluctantly.

The smile faded from the man's face. He glanced around the class, then turned and looked up at the door, then reached into his robe and consulted a set of papers. "Room 342b… Ah." He looked up with another forced smile. "So I am. Rin—that is to say, _Professor_ Rincewind, at your service."

"You're going to be teaching us." Hermoine's face, formerly etched in disbelief, slowly collapsed into gloom.

The rest of the class shared a collective sigh. Well, at least he wasn't Professor Gandalf.

"Right. Yes. Ah…" Professor Rincewind dithered about anxiously in front of the classroom door for a moment, finally caught sight of the podium at the head of the class, and dashed up the aisle to meet it. After cowering behind it for a moment, he slowly straightened up and eyed the class warily, seemingly using the podium almost as a shield. "Right. I am Professor Rincewind, which means I am your professor, which means you are not to assault or threaten me in any way. Is that understood?"

"Yes sir," responded the class dutifully, but Harry saw more than one twinkling eye in the class. Draco Malfoy, surprisingly, did not have one, apparently Professor Gandalf had made a definite impression.

"Good." Professor Rincewind seemed to gain some confidence and he ventured a few steps away from the podium. "Now… let me see…" he licked his lips nervously. "I'm… ah… I'm supposed to actually teach you, I take it?"

"Yes." Hermoine piped up quickly, before any of her delighted classmates could seize the opportunity. "You're a professor, aren't you?"

The man seemed to bridle a little. "Yes. Yes of course I am. But professors don't actually… teach classes…" he glanced around the room again. "…do they?"

"Of course they do!" Hermoine snapped.

Professor Rincewind chewed his lip nervously. "It seems very irregular…" he muttered, casting a longing look toward the windows. "…not at all how they manage things at Unseen University… well, nothing for it." He took a deep breath. "So once again, I AM Professor Rincewind and I will…" he made a little hopeless gesture, "…be teaching you, apparently. And I will be teaching…" he paused at this, a curiously blank expression on his features.

The class waited.

"…I don't suppose this is the class on foreign languages and cultures, is it?" He ventured hopefully. "I know how to scream in ninety-seven different languages."

"No," came a few replies. Apparently no one felt like learning foreign languages.

The man deflated a little. "Drat."

"What is your specialty, Professor Rincewind?" Hermoine had a suspicious look in her eye.

"Specialty?" Rincewind looked oddly wary.

"Your title. Your field of study."

"Oh! That. Well, back at Unseen University, I was the professor of Cruel and Unusual Geography." He looked thoughtful a moment. "I've never TAUGHT a class on it before, but I suppose…"

"That's not what we're learning either." Ron cut in. The rest of the class nodded, seemingly nervous about what 'cruel geography' might entail. The only one not nodding, Hermoine, seemed more absolutely flabbergasted at how Professor Rincewind had never taught a class.

"Well, what about…"

"Sir?" Neville raised a cautious hand. "Didn't Professor Dumbledore tell you what the class was?"

Rincewind looked blank for a second, then his face cleared. "Oh! Was he the old man upstairs?"

Apparently struck speechless by this offhand description of Professor Dumbledore, Neville could only nod.

"Oh. Well, to be honest, I didn't really stick around to find out what he had to say. Rule one of surviving danger, beware of smiling old men."

Neville blinked. "Is that… is that a lesson, sir?"

"Lesson?" Rincewind blinked back. "Do you mean… why, is that what this class is about? Surviving danger?"

Hermoine, still speechless, did not reply, and the class took a few moments to reach a consensus, but finally, a few heads nodded.

"OH! Well, I can definitely help with that." Rincewind drew himself up, a more officious expression settling upon his features. "Yes, most definitely. Practically the world's expert on surviving danger." He came out from behind the podium and dusted his hands. "Watch carefully, all of you."

Professor Rincewind squatted in the middle of the aisle, one leg bent, the other straight out behind him, both hands bracing himself off the ground. "Taking notes?" He asked.

Hermoine, her face a study in confusion, fumbled for her notebook, but before she could do anything, Professor Rincewind leapt forward and ran out of the classroom.

Astonished silence hung over the classroom. "Maybe he… forgot something?" ventured Neville.

The thought was hardly expressed when the professor's ragged face poked itself back in the door. "Well? Are you coming?"

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><p>Four-and-thirty students, all in their black billowing robes, jogged along one of Hogwart's many paths. Mouth open, foreheads glistening, feet desperately pounding the ground, they struggled along in a hopeless attempt to keep their remarkably fleet-footed professor in sight.<p>

"I… I… I think… I saw him… go left… at the hill… up there…" panted Ron.

"Left…? Im… possible! That's out… toward… the… Whomping… Willow!" Harry panted in response. For once he was grateful for the Durseleys. He'd never given it much thought, but he supposed his harsh upbringing HAD made him fit—more or less. Certainly better than Draco, who looked furiously indignant as he gasped along with the others, or poor Neville, who was half-choking in all the dust somewhere in the rear. As for Hermoine, who was just a little behind him and Ron, her face was pale as death and her hair a horrid mess, but her mouth was set in a terse line and her face in an expression of divine determination, as if nothing short of death would keep her from completing this lesson.

Certainly it was one of the stranger lessons Harry had ever had, in that, so far as he could see, it had NOTHING to do with magic. And, if their professor HAD turned left at the hill, as Ron had reported, it was likely to be the last lesson they ever received from this odd instructor.

"We've… got to… stop him!" Harry gasped out. "He… must not… have known about… the willow!"

"Eh?" responded Ron, who'd been glancing back at Hermoine. For some reason he'd been doing that a lot.

"I… said, we've got… to stop… him!" Harry put on a last burst of speed and charged for the hill. Four-and-thirty black-clad students puffed along behind him, grateful for the moment to have a less elusive leader.

Before they'd even gotten halfway there, however, a plume of dust appeared on the horizon, and Professor Rincewind appeared, running nearly twice as fast as before. "Nice run, hey kids?" He gasped. "I think that's probably enough for today. What say we head back?"

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><p>Four-and-thirty black-robed students, back in their Dark Arts classroom, collapsed gratefully into their desks. Professor Rincewind made his way up to the front, picking abstractedly at a new tear in his robe. "Not bad for the first day." He said approvingly. "None of you have the crucial element, of course, but no doubt that'll appear when the time comes."<p>

"Crucial… element?" Hermoine managed, brushing back her hair.

"Yes." Rincewind nodded. "Fear. Stark, last-minute desperation makes all the difference in how fast one runs. But it's hard to reproduce in a classroom, of course, so we'll just do without for now. In the meantime." He clapped his hands together. "I want you all to buy running shoes and wear them to class tomorrow. Report down at the atrium, we'll all do a quick jog around the University and then get to discussing the best ways to escape a room. But make sure to bring the shoes. And hats." He added, looking around the class. "Definitely some long, pointy hats would be in order. Also, try to… yes?"

"Sir…" It was Ron, who had somehow managed to regain his breath. "What… other sorts of things will we learning? Besides running?"

Professor Rincewind seemed a little taken aback by the question, but he rallied and answered: "Well… basic matters, I suppose. Jogging, dashing, surreptitiously hurrying, galloping…"

"No, I meant…" Ron hesitated a moment. "I just… are we going to be learning, like, any spells?" Catching a somewhat cagy look in his teacher's eyes, he hurried to explain, "I mean, this isn't PE class. This is Defense Against the Dark Arts, after all."

Professor Rincewind's eyes grew very large. His mouth fell open.

"DEFENSE?"

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><p><strong>AN:** Rincewind is perhaps the worst possible person to teach DAtDA. About as far away from Gandalf as one can get. I'm pretty sure he won't stick around for long, though.

Another installment in the "Exchange Program" series. There's not really many I can do of these, but I have an idea for at least one more, from this universe.

EDIT: Picture credit for the cover goes to JuneJenssen. Visit her gallery here: junejenssen. / gallery/


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